Yesterday (Mon. 6-10) was hard. I battled two villains all day–winds of 20 mph, gusting to 30, and some lengthy steep hills. I was heading west and north during the day and the winds were coming from the west, so the stiff breeze was either trying to stop me in my tracks or knock me over. In addition to the wind and climbs, my route yesterday was long; I covered 67.5 miles and didn’t get to my motel in Conrad (pop. 2,570) until 8:30 p.m. Today (Tues. 6-11) I took the day off, before I will once again need to head out into the wind.

You may be wondering–“hey, aren’t you supposed to be in the mountains by now?” The answer is that the mountains are very close–I could see them in the distance off to my left all day–but my Adventure Cycling route is taking me north before it takes me through them in the coming days.

Here is a view of the Missouri River in a photo I took on Sunday afternoon (6-9) right behind my motel. I crossed it on my ride west from Great Falls yesterday.

As a Ford man, I couldn’t resist taking a photo of this sign celebrating the 70th anniversary of Ford’s Drive-in restaurant in Great Falls. I’m guessing there aren’t too many drive-ins that have been around that long.

One of the things you notice when you aren’t driving 70 mph and are close to the side of the road are some of the flowers along the way. I suppose the following examples are weeds, but I don’t care.

And here is the shadow of a guy on a bike taking a picture of some white flowers by the side of the road.

By around 2 p.m., I was getting pretty tired and needing a break, so I drove a mile off route to Power, MT (pop. 197). Power has two amenities, a bar and an agricultural co-op. I chose the latter as a place to stop for a snack.

There wasn’t a place to sit outside the co-op.

And there was only one place to sit inside the co-op–this large white rocking chair, which was just perfect!

I continued to battle wind for the next hour-and-a-half and then dropped by the Golden Harvest Cafe, which I passed on my way through Dutton, MT (pop. 316). While eating a cheeseburger and some sweet potato fries, I met Don, a farmer in the area. He had been out spraying his fields that day but had to quit due to the strong winds. Don is 72 and continues to farm 4,000 acres. He said at one time, he farmed 16,000 acres. He was born in Kalamazoo, MI but grew up in Chicago. He played football at Montana State (notice his shirt) and married a farmer’s daughter in the area, after which he took up farming and stayed in Montana. The woman running the cafe is Amy, who happens to be Don’s next-door neighbor, and who moved to Montana from Tennessee a couple years ago. Here are Amy and Don.

Don said he would be at a bar (make that “the” bar) in Brady, MT (pop. 140), a town I would be passing through later that afternoon, and that I should stop by and he would buy me a beer. This was tempting, but I was growing concerned about the 25 windy miles I still needed to cover and there would be no time for that.

There was some beautiful countryside coming out of Dutton, depicted below. About an hour past Dutton, I crossed the Teton River.

It was already after 7 p.m. as I was heading west from Brady, and it appeared there were some storms underway up ahead. Thankfully, I somehow managed to bypass them this time.

This morning (6-11) at breakfast, I met Terri and John from Missouri. They are taking a meandering vacation in Montana and elsewhere and were very interested in my trip and some of the small towns I’ve seen. They are headed east and may be covering some of my route, which will also take them through Minnesota. John used to go fishing with his dad in Minnesota.

I talked a lot with John and Terri about bears. They had recently seen evidence of bears in Glacier National Park, where I am headed in the coming days. They very generously gave me this cannister of bear spray, which they said they won’t be needing any longer. Those of you out there with a legal background I think will be as amused as I was to see the name of the bear spray, UDAP, which we know to stand for “unfair and deceptive acts and practices.”

John used to have a hardware store and was kind enough to give me some advice on getting another metric allen wrench to tighten the side mirror on my bike (I had one but lost it when I was repairing one of my flat tires last week).

Thankfully, the guys at the Mountain View Co-op a short walk from my motel in Conrad carried a set of metric allen wrenches and thoughtfully opened the package to make sure they would work for me before I bought them. The no. 3 metric wrench turned out to be just what I needed.

When I looked at this “If You’re Lookin’ You’re Stoppin’” Sign on the Main Drive-In, I knew I would be stoppin’ too. They make a great root beer float.

The birds around the drive-in also seem to like their food. Here was a bird (a black-capped chickadee, I think?) sampling the fare under the table next to mine.

It has continued to be very windy today–I can hear it whistling outside my motel room window right now. As I write this, I’ve checked tomorrow’s weather report and see that there is another wind advisory for the day, with winds predicted of 21 mph, gusting to 33 mph. The wind will be coming directly from the west, and I will be heading right into it. Thankfully, my route to tomorrow’s destination, Valier (pop. 509), is only 25 miles.